Dean Johns: BN is a National Affront!

Umno members stomp on a cow's head to protest Hindu temple (Samsul Said)

BN adds insult to injury
Dean Johns | Malaysiakini
12:01PM Apr 11, 2012

Barisan Nasional, it seems to me, has got itself trapped in a classic lose-lose situation.

Courtesy of Mob's Crib

Not only is this rotten regime increasingly revealed as a nothing but a national front for the criminality of its members and cronies, but it is causing even more national affront by its brazen attempts to conceal, deny, excuse and above all continue committing its crimes.

For example, as if it wasn't reprehensible enough to be responsible for the death of the innocent Teoh Beng Hock in the custody of its anti-corruption commission, BN proceeded to insult Malaysians' intelligence by staging an ‘inquest' that found his death to be due to "neither homicide nor suicide."

And now, in a further cold-blooded slap in the face to Teoh's bereaved family and friends, and to the outrage of the Malaysian people at large, the Attorney-General's Office has announced that three MACC officers allegedly involved in Teoh's death have no case to answer.

But it gets even more offensive than this.

Nation's sleaziest crook moonlights
as the Attorney-General

The aforesaid attorney-general, Abdul Gani Patail (left), was the lead prosecutor in the BN regime's first trial of Anwar Ibrahim on trumped-up sodomy charges, and is now, together with former inspector-general of police Musa Hassan, subject to sworn allegations of involvement in organised crime.

If the elevation of a figure as suspect as Gani Patail to the office of attorney-general isn't sufficiently insulting to the Malaysian people and the principle of justice, then I don't know what would be.

Devious and duplicitous

The most reviled & ridiculed
home minister to date

But of course I actually know only too well: it would be the saddling of Malaysia with a home minister as devious, duplicitous and downright disgraceful as Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak's cousin, Hishammuddin Hussein (right), who recently blithely dismissed the organised crime allegations against Gani Patail as "unsubstantiated."

Hishammuddin, of course, is the minister in overall charge of Malaysia's insulting apologies for ‘law-enforcement' agencies, and thus ultimately responsible for the blackest blot on the BN regime's dark record, the deaths of Teoh Beng Hock and countless other ‘suspects' in fake ‘shoot-outs' and ‘accidents' in custody.

But as deeply offensive to all Malaysians as it has been to be handed Hishammuddin as their chief ‘protector', the most outrageous insult of all by BN to Malaysia and Malaysians was the appointment three years ago of Najib Abdul Razak as prime minister.

It would be difficult to show more contempt for the people than to so scorn their revulsion at the murder of Altantuya Shaariibuu, the Mongolian woman involved in the notorious Scorpene submarine scandal, as to elevate the defence minister suspected of involvement in these crimes to the nation's highest office.

No garland big enough to conceal the stench of insatiable greed (The Malaysian Insider)

Yet that's precisely what BN did.

And the Malaysian people have had to live under the shadow of this deadly insult ever since.

And what an insult and an embarrassment it has been, and continues to be.

Having sworn on the Quran that he had nothing to do with the Scorpene submarines or Altantuya Shaariibuu affairs, Najib has not only presided over the continued extra-judicial killings of ‘suspects' like Teoh Beng Hock, but has further compounded these offences by contemptibly failing to press for their proper investigation.

Luxury coach trip with the fake Mentri Besar of Perak

Then, as if determined to heap further insult on such injury to victims of his criminal regime, he's called on his BN collaborators and cronies to defend Putrajaya with still more "broken bodies" and "lost lives."

He's insulted the intelligence of every Malaysian by calling on them to have faith in his lying "1Malaysia" slogan, despite all the while betraying their desire for racial and religious harmony by covertly sponsoring hate-mongers like Perkasa, Ibrahim Ali and Utusan Malaysia.

Najib: "We will defend Putrajaya with our broken bodies..." Against whom?

Daylight robberies

To grievous financial injuries to the people like the RM12-billion PKFZ scandal, the rape of Sarawak's resources by the Taib dynasty and dozens of other daylight robberies, he's added the insult of allowing these and other thieves get away scot free.

To the injury he's done to the nation through his own and his accomplices' profligacy with public money, he's added the insult of calling on Malaysians to tighten their belts and curb their personal spending.

Saiful Bukhari Azlan's infamous anus almost derailed Anwar's career (AFP)

To the injury he inflicted on Anwar Ibrahim by subjecting him to a trial on yet another trumped-up sodomy charge, he added the insult of trying to further smear Anwar by permitting if not actually supporting the production and dissemination of the ‘Datuk T' sex tapes.

To the injury he's done Malaysia's international reputation through spending a fortune on fake documentaries for Bloomberg and the BBC and ludicrous PR campaigns on his own and his consort's images, he's added the insult of using an Israeli-owned PR company while posing as pro-Palestinian.

To the injury he does the Malaysian people by persisting in suppressing the news media by means of the pernicious Printing, Presses and Publications Act, he's added the insult of falsely pretending to promote press freedom and claiming that Malaysia's mendacious media are among the world's best.

Just as his doltish deputy, Muhyiddin Yassin has attempted to cover-up the injury that BN has inflicted on Malaysia's education system with the insulting claim that it is better than that of the US, UK or Germany.
And most unforgivably of all, as aware as you or me that he and his regime are utterly unelectable in a clean and fair contest, Najib is determined to keep doing the democratic process an injury by every traditional BN means - gerrymandering, roll-stacking, foreigner-registration, voter cloning, postal-vote manipulation and blatant bribery.

While simultaneously adding the insult of pretending to be a ‘transformer' and staging a phony inquiry into electoral ‘reforms' that he has no intention whatever of instituting.

Shahrizat & Najib: RM250 million worth of bull

Meanwhile, he's added the insult of declaring himself the minister for women, family and community development to the injury of refusing to fire the previous incumbent, failed political candidate and back-door senator Shahrizat Abdul Jalil, for her family's involvement in the National feedlot scandal.

And in the process of announcing this move, he had the additional effrontery to declare that Shahrizat, in retaining her post as chief of Wanita Umno, "will assure a big win for the BN in the upcoming general election," and to add that "I dare say that the people are gradually coming back to us; their affection for us is rising.

To which all I can say is that, far from feeling renewed affection for Barisan Nasional, more and more Malaysians are affronted and offended by Najib and his accomplices' every word and deed. And thus the suggestion that this gang of crooks deserves even one more day in office, let along five more years, only adds yet another deadly insult to decades of unforgivable injury.

The Last Umno Emperor, Ah Jib Gor

[This is such a powerful piece I felt compelled to share it with those who don't subscribe to Malaysiakini!]

Shaariibuu Setev, father of murdered Mongolian beauty Altantuya, wants to help connect the dots...

“I met her for the last time before she left for Malaysia and I asked her what was her travel purpose.  She showed me a picture of her, Najib Tun Razak and (political advisor) Abdul Razak Baginda which was taken in Paris. She pointed to Najib in the picture and told me she had something to decide with him. I told her that it was not worth it but she went anyway.” 


[Source: FreeMalaysiaToday]

The Fig Leaf Syndrome (revisited)

“Is that a gun in your pocket, Big Boy, or are you just happy to see me?” ~ Mae West

IT’S ALL A COVER-UP, FOLKS!

How often I’ve heard this uttered in connection with financial and political shenanigans of every strain which, disappointingly, always seem to fade from the public memory before anything can be resolved, or anyone brought to book.

And each time I hear about cover-ups, the image of a fig leaf pops unbidden to mind. Is there a connection? Of course there is. In moments of luminous clarity, the universe has always shown itself to me to be essentially one inexhaustibly funny, punny conundrum.

TRANSPARENCY is a much bandied about term these days. I’m not too comfortable with the word “transparent.” It implies invisibility – which, in turn, suggests unaccountability – a hidden hand, someone or something difficult to see. Like the Emperor’s multibillion dollar new suit. So why don’t we use the more organic description: NAKED?

Why do we get so steamed up by the idea of nakedness that we actually have laws against it? Indeed in some countries there are laws to prevent Official Secrets from being exposed. In effect, the Cover-Up is actually a protected form of official behavior, and my thesis is that this inbred fear of public exposure is ultimately linked to our attitude towards sex - whether we view it as a profane or sacred act.

The fig leaf was the preferred form of cover-up in Europe for parts of the human anatomy deemed “private.” You find it in old paintings depicting Adam and Eve after their expulsion from the Garden of Eden. Why the fig leaf? Why the need to conceal this unmentionably delectable portion of our bodies? After all, the human body has been described as a Temple of Divinity, the Sacred Abode of God.

The Old Testament explanation is mind-bogglingly simplistic: having disobeyed God by eating the Forbidden Fruit from the Tree of Knowledge, Adam and Eve lost their innocence and knew Shame. But why did the Maker set them up for such a Fall? Is God basically a cosmic Peeping Tom masquerading as Scientific Curiosity?

Interestingly, the Malay word for genitalia is kemaluan – from malu which means (what else?) shame. However, the Arabs allude to the female sexual organs with the richly suggestive expression, al ghaib – “the concealed” or “the invisible” – in other words, “the Mystery of Mysteries.” (Male genitals do not enjoy such poetic licence, for obvious reasons. Colloquially, the penis is given names like batang and butoh – the onomatopoeic equivalents of “dong” and “dick” – with all their bluntly bellicose and brutal, yet cute and comical, connotations.)

Famous Nudes

SINCE THE FIG LEAF SYNDROME gained prominence during the Renaissance, we must assume that it was a purely aesthetic choice, reinforced by convenience – for, in Italy, which produced the famous nudes of Raphael, Rubens, Da Vinci and Michelangelo, the fig tree grows ubiquitously. It’s easy to imagine how the first fig leaf cover-up was conceived: here’s Leonardo happily painting his mistress in her garden under a fig tree, but when he reaches below the waistline he suddenly realises that he can’t go for complete realism without inflaming papal passions and getting hauled up by the Almighty Church of Rome. Just then the fig tree sheds a leaf which flutters lazily down in front of his model – and gets strategically integrated into the final portrait.

In the Middle East such problems did not arise. Patriarchal notions of modesty forbade the realistic depiction of biological forms, so artists confined themselves to the abstractions of sacred geometry - wherein maleness could be represented by lines and angles, and femaleness by arcs and orbs. The dome-and-spire leitmotiv found in Christian and Islamic architecture gained wide popularity, not least because of its potent subliminal reference to forbidden pleasures. And don’t forget the genital worship suggested in the design of all pagan temples: lingams and yonis, phalluses and vulvas, lines and circles, plugs and sockets everywhere one looks.


At the root of the Fig Leaf Syndrome, a primal trauma lies buried beneath countless generations of guilt and resentment. All myths point to the source of our existential angst and collective schizophrenia: SEX! SEX! SEX! Yes, what Adam and Eve discovered after eating the Forbidden Fruit.


Plants have been doing it for aeons – but, really, you can’t get too worked up over the mechanics of pollination. Animals do it but can’t really help it and, then, only seasonally – and therefore they feel neither good nor bad about it. With animals, sex is totally guilt-free and rarely kinky. However, when WE decided to get into the act by sliding down the Timechute into physical space, we externalized our male-female polarities and got titillated by the principles of attraction and repulsion: at last we could experience the hormonal rollercoaster ride of biological necessity and non-specific year-round lust. It was so wonderfully heady and exhilarating. At least for a while…

Then we realized with profound horror that we had traded in our original, immortal, asexual androgyny for the ephemeral delights and infernal agonies of mortal, animal being. We were packaged in meat. We were The Word made Flesh!

Wherever we turned we saw images of ourselves. This Hall of Mirrors was a regular funhouse, but narcissism eventually gets out of hand. As sexually-split entities inhabiting gender-differentiated bodies, we could now enjoy sticking our protruding bits into every inviting orifice and eventually turn SEX into the biggest business of all time – simply by making it illicit unless sanctioned by a secular or religious authority.

Moral Responsibility

I USED TO WAKE UP in a cold sweat, heart pounding, from dreams in which I would find myself attending a grand buffet where everyone was formally attired, and all of a sudden I’d realize I was wearing a T-shirt – and nothing else! Worse still were the episodes in which I would walk through a door and onto a stage, facing a packed hall, with absolutely no idea how to entertain the audience and no memory of any script. Slowly it would dawn on me that my predicament was even more ludicrous than I’d thought: people were squirming in their seats and tittering because I was completely starkers. Classic nightmares, boringly Freudian – but what did they reveal, apart from my modest assets?

Some people are very secretive. I’m the complete opposite. No question of right or wrong: it’s the way we’re horoscopically or psychologically constituted. However, I’ve always felt that one has a moral responsibility to evolve towards greater openness, greater honesty, greater transparency… in other words, NAKEDNESS.

In which case my scary dreams of public exposure weren’t necessarily a bad thing – merely an indication that deep down I was still afraid of getting hurt. To be more precise, my social ego was afraid of losing status. Without the protection of one’s fig leaf or sarong or double-stitched jeans, one is susceptible to malicious attack or ridicule. One is vulnerable – but is it such a healthy thing to be invulnerable? Isn’t it much healthier to be in direct contact with RAW REALITY and the NAKED TRUTH?

I’ve tried it. It doesn’t hurt. And once your reputation is ruined you never have to worry about it again.

All You Gotta Do Is, Act Naturally…
“… for Heaven, just Heaven, sends a fearful religion to cruel souls.” – Jacques-Henri Bernardin de Saint-Pierre, 1788

THE PATRIARCHAL RELIGIONS - the ones that see God as a father figure - have one thing in common: the misguided notion that the naked human body is an utterly reprehensible, prurient object – a terrible thing that must be covered up from public view. In such a society, it’s okay to exploit the poor and deceive the masses – so long as you keep your trousers on!

How else is it possible that some humans can wander into an old-growth forest with all its splendor and majesty and breath-giving beauty – and whip out their chainsaws? Me, I could only think of whipping off my clothes and jumping into the nearest river with a wild whoop of pure abandon. Call me a pagan. The raw beauty of Mother Nature is the only embodiment of divinity on this Earth that can make me fall to my knees and weep for joy.

A few years ago I was walking with a friend through the jungle towards a magnificent waterfall when I came upon a Land Rover full of forestry officers. I nodded a friendly greeting and one of the men came over, ogled my companion, and asked me point blank: “Have you seen anyone swimming naked around here?” I was taken aback. Was this guy a mind reader or something? I responded evenly: “Why do you ask?” The fat forestry officer with the sleazy aura of a Hollywood-type South American border guard explained conspiratorially: “We don’t want people to come into our state forest reserve and do immoral things.”

If I could beam myself back to that instant in time and space, I would have retorted: “Do immoral things? What, you mean like LOG the place? You don’t wish to see this beautiful country DENUDED, is that right?”

Instead, I merely smiled sardonically and walked on, shaking my head in disbelief. For hours afterward I felt an involuntary shudder whenever the image of that hypocritical sleazebag flashed into my head. Good heavens, the wriggling can of worms some folks have for brains! Perhaps I ought to put up a sign outside every forest reserve: “SNOG, DON’T LOG!” Or “DON’T BE RUDE, COME IN NUDE!”


Is it any wonder, then, that in a patriarchal society, prominent people are often the target of sexual innuendoes and outright scandal? The idea of “immorality” is always applied to sexual indiscretion, but never to breaking the Golden Rule - Do as you would be done by – which is, essentially and ultimately, the only true measure of morality.

[First published in JOURNAL ONE, 1996; posted on this blog 1 February 2007]

Tokyo Soil Samples Would Be Considered Nuclear Waste In The U.S. ~ Arnie Gundersen

Arnold "Arnie" Gundersen is chief engineer of energy consulting company Fairewinds Associates and a former nuclear power industry executive, and who has questioned the safety of the Westinghouse AP1000, a proposed third-generation nuclear reactor. Gundersen has also expressed concerns about the operation of the Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Plant. He served as an expert witness in the investigation of the Three Mile Island accident. [Source: Wikipedia]

Only the clinically insane or terminally greedy would continue advocating nuclear fission plants! Najib must be both...